Self Compassion and Growth - with Kamini Wood

Embark on an enlightening exploration of self-awareness and personal growth in this episode of the Two Piers Podcast, hosted by Erica D'Eramo with special guest Kamini Wood. Delve into Kamini's inspiring journey from feeling like an outsider to becoming an international best-selling author and founder of Live Joy Your Way. Discover the importance of intersectionality in understanding identity and experiences, as Erica and Kamini discuss overcoming false beliefs, nurturing self-compassion, and embracing curiosity for growth. Tune in for insightful conversations that will empower you to rewrite your own narrative and live authentically.

To connect with Kamini, you can visit her website at www.kaminiwood.com or find her on social media via Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn.

Transcript

Erica D'Eramo: 0:05

Hello and welcome to the Two Piers podcast. I'm your host Erica D'Eramo. Today we have guest joining us, Kamini Wood. She's the founder and CEO of Live Joy Your Way and the AuthenticMe RiseUp Program. An international best selling author, her mission is to guide her clients in nurturing their mental, emotional, physical and strategic plans for their lives. Recognising the profound impact of self leadership and inner dialogues on external outcomes. She works collaboratively with her clients to address both external goals and challenges as well as the internal responses, thoughts and behaviors that may hinder their desired results. Internal obstacles that get in the way include lack of boundaries, people pleasing over giving over functioning, hyper achievement, perfectionism, procrastination, burnout, self doubt and impostor syndrome, as well as other false beliefs about self. Some of our favorite topics to discuss here at Two Piers. company is based out of North Carolina, but serves clients all over the world virtually. And we are very excited to have her come talk to us today and explore this concept of maybe self compassion or false beliefs, all of these different barriers that get in the way of us achieving our goals. So happy to have you join us, Kamini.

Kamini Wood: 1:31

Thank you, Erica. And thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here with you.

Erica D'Eramo: 1:37

Yeah, I found you know, your, your journey and your background to be really interesting, I love the topics that you work on. These are topics that are very close to our heart here at Two Piers. So before we kind of get started, in your own words, can you just share with us what your origin story is, like what led to the Kamini that we have before us today?

Kamini Wood: 1:59

Absolutely. So the Kamini that sits before you did not get here by taking a linear path. I, you know, was brought up I'm going to start with my my origin origin story. So I grew up in suburban town in Connecticut, predominantly white town. My parents are first generation, I'm first generation American, they were immigrants. My parents came here, my mom was 13, my dad was about 19. And we ended up settling in Connecticut was my sister and I growing up in our household. And, you know, I mentioned it was predominantly white not because to create, you know, this divert, you know, that this distinction between races, but instead it was just recognizing that as a little girl growing up in a, in a school that tended to be a place where I looked different, and clearly had a different sounding name than most other people. As my five or six year old self, I knew that I wasn't exactly quote unquote, the same and so my, my younger self tried to find ways to fit in. And the way that I did that was by people pleasing and by kind of trying to be all the things to all people so that they would accept me and I have that sense of belonging. Now my younger self didn't know that that's what what I was doing. But that's how I solve that situation for myself. And also, I mentioned my parents being immigrants, they definitely had a very strong work ethic and, and performance ethic. And so for them, there was a lot of time that they were they spent working and and as a young, young individual watching them, one of the things that I I really took on was this idea of I did not want to be a burden, because I knew that they were working really hard. And so that's where not only so that people pleasing came from a social perspective. But that perfectionism for me personally came from that that idea of not wanting to be a burden. Again, I share this because it is really part of how I ended up here today. I took all of those things with me throughout my younger years into adulthood, not really knowing that they were operating in the background. And, you know, from a professional standpoint, I ended up as a project manager and then ran a project management office and every role that I was in, I kept leaning into talking to people about what they needed in order to grow and expand and to be successful in their own right. So professionally, I was really enjoying that aspect of my work. But at the same time, personally, I became the mom to five, and my middle daughter, actually at the time. So this was about seven No, it was more like eight years ago, she started showing a lot of people pleasing and perfectionist tendencies. And it was through my children that I saw their behavior, my behaviors are being mirrored back to me, right? They were my catalyst I often totally I own and say that my children are my greatest teachers. But with that, having being mirrored back to me, I recognized I needed to do some work because I was not only showing up as a perfectionist and the people pleaser, I was also holding myself back. And so I did that self work and I went through the The tough moments of self awareness, so that I could show up differently as a mom. But I say that I went through that experience, because what that allowed me to do is say, I can now take this experience, and I can actually help other people who have maybe had similar experiences, or are experiencing those false beliefs, like, you know, I have to people, please in order to belong, or I have to be perfect, because otherwise I'll be a burden. Or I have to be perfect, because, you know, people will see me as a failure, whatever those limiting beliefs are, I can now take those that experience with that, take my professional acumen of really hearing people and actively listening to them, I can combine them together and create this practice that I have now, which is truly serving people one to one.

Erica D'Eramo: 5:43

Yeah, as you kind of go through your story, I'm sure that that's going to resonate with a lot of individuals listening to this. And it's, it's another reminder about the importance of taking this intersectional view of how we're all operating in the world, because it wasn't just about gender, right. And it wasn't just about your heritage, or you know, how many generations had been here, it was all it was how all of these factors combined into the influences that you saw. So really interesting perspective that I think could resonate with a lot of different lived experiences.

Kamini Wood: 6:23

I love what you just said, the intersection of all of these parts, because I do think that we tend to think it's one thing and not recognizing that all of these different pieces and parts intertwine intersect, I love your word, they intersect to create how we are showing up in our life. And when we can recognize that and give it space, we can actually then move through what we need to.

Erica D'Eramo: 6:49

Yeah, I mean, we're gonna give a shout out to Kimberlee Crenshaw, here for her or in intersectionality and coining that term way back when the legal scholar Kimberlee Crenshaw, so I don't want to be Stolen Valor there. But yes, it's a really, it's a really important concept that I think, especially in this work, where you mentioned, you know, why you're bringing up like growing up in a white, predominantly white area of Connecticut. And I know that these days, there is a lot of discourse around division and us versus them, and we want, you know, we want less of that. And also our identities fundamentally do shape our experiences and how others have treated us and how we've navigated the world. So I think it is an important, an important piece of the story. Yeah.

Kamini Wood: 7:40

Yeah. Yeah. And to that point to talking about it reduces shame around it, right? Because if we continue to say, well, we don't want that. And we keep running away from just conversations that include it, or also, in some sense, contributing to internalized shame.

Erica D'Eramo: 7:58

Yeah, I mean, as coaches, that's something we like to explore, right, like bringing curiosity to these conversations. If there's a discomfort, like, let's look, let's look a little more. Because we want to integrate all of this not compartmentalize and divide. And, and

Kamini Wood: 8:17

Yes.

Erica D'Eramo: 8:17

...and put it away.

Kamini Wood: 8:18

Yeah, absolutely.

Erica D'Eramo: 8:20

So tell me a little bit about what drew you to the work that you're doing. You mentioned your daughter being, you know, somewhat of a catalyst. Tell me a little bit more about what made this like your life's work?

Kamini Wood: 8:32

That's such a great question, because she was a catalyst. And now I will say that she was a catalyst to my own awakenings around how I was holding myself back and what limiting beliefs I was carrying. I do believe that that also shaped me into a more conscious parent, as a side note, but the reason they're the way that this really drew me in was when I went through that self awareness and understood myself on that deeper level. Not only did I recognize how I could now show up differently, but it was sort of this calling of this experience is happening in order for you to pay this forward. Right? It's, it's, it's almost recognizing that life is a journey that's happening through us, not to us. And so I can now take this experience that I've had and take my journey that maybe has taken me several years, and I can help support people so that maybe they can go through the journey, not in it. We don't truncate it to like, you know, minutes or weeks. But we can, I can certainly take the experience and I can support other people on their journey to their self awareness and self understanding. Because really what I felt was, what I learned was that so many of us either try to pathologize or to diagnose like, this is what's wrong with me. And instead it's like, oh, wow, if I just give myself permission to understand myself, I can I suddenly have this path. way of being able to move myself forward instead of just being stagnant or stuck in a certain box or label that I've sort of just assimilated and taken on this mind.

Erica D'Eramo: 10:10

Right. Yeah, I really love that framing. Because sometimes we just compound the very issue of being able to trust ourselves and build more confidence when we beat up on ourselves about the patterns and behaviors that are probably there for a good reason, right? They've served us in the past, they've kept us safe in the past, maybe now they're not as effective, like our operating system from 2000 Probably shouldn't be our operating system for 2024. We'll do some upgrades. But like, fundamentally, I think we see a lot with women in particular, around the narrative of imposter syndrome, right? We even they even took the word or the the term that was initially coined imposter phenomenon, like an observed set of behaviors in context, and then pathologized it to be a syndrome that we have to fix, rather than this being like a logical response to our surroundings.

Kamini Wood: 11:11

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's such a great point. I think that we do that a lot with many things. We call them syndromes, suddenly, now, they're, you know, diagnoses or pathologies, that we've got to suddenly go fix and, right, better.

Erica D'Eramo: 11:26

Which then compounds, this whole issue of constantly trying to change ourselves adapt perfect, right? Like it's feeding into that exact Absolutely. pattern that we're trying to break. So tell us a little bit about, I mean, we mentioned talking through self compassion, how do you define self compassion? Like, what does that mean to you?

Kamini Wood: 11:47

Mean? Yeah, so I really, I love Kristin Neff and Chris Germer, who are kind of researchers on self compassion. And so I really follow how Kristin describes it, which is the very first thing when we're talking about self compassion is the concept of kindness over judgment. And so how I describe that is recognizing that we will make choices or decisions in our throughout the course of our lives. And there will be moments where maybe we look at that and say, Okay, that was a mistake, or that did not turn out the way that I wanted it to, instead of going into this place of what's wrong with me, why what why did I choose that I'm, you know, an idiot for doing that. It's leaning into kindness, like, wow, Okay, that did not turn out the way that I wanted it to? What did I learn? How can I grow from this? Where do I choose to go now? Which is, you know, when we think about judgment, so often, I think, especially high achievers, almost convinced themselves, that it's the judgment that that will catapult them and continue to move them forward. I know, I absolutely believe that, you know, if I beat myself up, and I'll, it'll push me it'll inspire me to do better, when in fact, what happens is, it may push you for the short amount of time, but eventually it plateaus. Because we we actually will burn ourselves out, when we start to when we start to believe that, you know, there's something wrong with us. So when Kristin Neff talks about kindness over judgment, it really is saying, even if something doesn't go the way that we want it to, we will use kindness over judgment. The second part of it is that common human humanity part where it is recognizing we're not isolated in our experiences. But instead, we are part of this idea of common humanity, where other people have had similar experiences to what what we have experienced as well. And so we can actually lean on other people to say, you know, to ask them, share your experience with me, be with me in this rather than I have to I'm isolated on my own. And then the third part of self compassion is mindfulness being in this moment, right here. And now. Because so often, we spend our days either ruminating over the past or we're worrying about the future. And self compassion says, we can recognize that and also come back to the present moment. Where am I right now? And what would be the best choice for me in this moment moving forward?

Erica D'Eramo: 14:07

Yeah, I love that. I mean, so I just recently finished an article on handling negative self talk like self criticality, and so much of what you're talking about right now is resonating a lot with that topic. Because we, yeah, a lot of high achievers have become very used to that voice, that critical, negative voice. And sometimes that voice again, kept us safe, right? Like it was watching out for us. It was keeping us away from the guardrails. Sometimes it was replicating the voices of the adults and people in power in our lives. And so when those voices maybe we went off to college, right, we didn't have those voices right in our air anymore. So we replicated it. But there's a point at which we kind of realized like, maybe, maybe this is not actually going to advance me forward. as effectively or efficiently as we want. And also, this is gonna be from somebody who doesn't have children. But I feel like when I see small beings, I can look at them and think like, I would never want somebody to speak to that small child who is worthy of love and care the way I have spoken to myself, right?

Kamini Wood: 15:24

Yes, yes. Yeah, I love that. You just said that. Because oftentimes people will get stuck on I don't know how to be compassionate to myself, because it's so unknown. And that's a great way to lean into that, which is, if you were speaking to a small child, or a friend or a loved one, what would you say? And then offer yourself the same? The same verbiage, the same, you know, compassion, the same empathy that you would offer to those individuals?

Erica D'Eramo: 15:55

Yeah. Because even the tough ones, right? Sometimes we're like, Well, I'm, but I'm tough, like, I can be tough on myself, it's fine. I have really high standards for myself, you can have really high standards for other people as well and still treat them with respect and compassion.

Kamini Wood: 16:10

Exactly. And to that point too that brings up another point of pushback that I'll get with self compassion, which is, well, I do have high standards. I do have high standards. And if I'm compassionate to myself that my standards will drop.

Erica D'Eramo: 16:23

Yeah.

Kamini Wood: 16:24

And that's just that is definitely a limiting or false belief where it's, it's not your it's not the judgment that had the highest standards, you already had the highest standards, you can still absolutely have them, it's how do you relate to those high standards? Do you judge yourself through them? Or do you continue to support yourself through kindness and compassion, and continue to hold you don't have to give up those high standards in order to be compassionate to yourself?

Erica D'Eramo: 16:49

Yeah, I think it was a book I read recently called Chatter. I'm trying to remember the author, but it's about like, sort of our internal dialogue. And they were talking about some polling that they had done with parents around who had kids who were athletes, and asking, you know, if you have a coach, who is always like screaming and yelling, and pushing your kid with, you know, negativity, would you prefer that? Or would you prefer the coach who like pushes your kid hard, but with compassion, and curiosity, and most parents, even the ones who really wanted their kids just to, to excel, recognize that the second option was more likely to lead to excelling, performance. And it wasn't just about being nice. It was also about performance that, you know, if you can remove yourself from the situation and look at it more objectively, you can see that just negativity and harshness does not is not the formula for high performance for over the long term. Yeah,

Kamini Wood: 17:57

Over the long term. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

Erica D'Eramo: 18:01

So you mentioned false beliefs. Tell us a little bit more about that, because I'm not sure that everyone is familiar with the term false beliefs. So what does that mean to you?

Kamini Wood: 18:10

Yeah, I think a lot of people if they've heard of it, termed a different way, they will maybe have heard of limiting beliefs or what I call false beliefs are the main ones, which are I'm not I'm not enough, or I'm not good enough. I'm unlovable is another one, I am not worthy, or I'm unworthy, undeserving, that one pops up a lot as well. Those would be I would say, examples of those false beliefs and those beliefs. Like for me, my example was, I don't belong, right. And so that, that, as I mentioned, that led to the people pleasing behaviors, why because that's how I compensated for that false belief in order to work through that. But what happens with these false beliefs is they're almost like the foundational wound, if we want to call it that, and parts of ourselves, then they they try to deal with that foundational wound by protecting us from it. But what happens is if we don't pay attention and unveil and become aware of what the false belief is, we're kind of just covering up with it with layers of other things. And so the work that I do with clients is, you know, in a very loving trauma informed trauma sensitive way is helping them become aware of what those false beliefs are, because once we're aware of it, and we've acknowledged what it is now we can take committed action to move ourselves through what is actually true, like for for me, for instance, I will say that the the belief the false belief of I don't belong, it may still pop its head up. Like I will give an example My sons are really into lacrosse, lacrosse happens to be still a very predominantly white sport. I walk into a room or into onto a field I should say, I walked to the field and most of the parents again, I look different than most of the parents that are there. I'm not saying it's across the board, just predominantly, you And I will say that that belief might pop up. But because I've done this work, I now can see it, acknowledge it. And then I can work through it with looking at my own value system, looking at what I actually know is true about myself. And I can take committed action to engage with those parents in a totally different way than I, then I would have, you know, eight or nine years ago when I was still carrying that false belief completely unaware that that's what was running the show.

Erica D'Eramo: 20:26

Yeah, there's this, this kind of framework that, and I'm not sure if this came up in your kind of coaching realm or training, but it was really eye opening for me, going through coaching, training, and looking at and I'm trying to remember, like, what the framework is actually called right now. But essentially it, it posits that beliefs lead to our feelings, which then lead to our actions, which then lead to the results. So we can start at any point in that chain. But people often forget that there is some underlying core belief that is driving the feeling that they're having about the situation that then drives their action, which then drives the outcome. So if we're, if we don't like what the outcome is that we're getting, Okay, well, then what is the action that we're doing that's contributing to that? Okay, why are we doing that? Because we feel a certain way we're motivated, we have some energy around it. And where did that come from? That always comes from the core belief structure, which we almost always take for granted. Because it's like part of the air we're breathing. So...

Kamini Wood: 21:33

Yes, because that's what's running on the subconscious level. It's the autopilot. It's the it's the narrative, you know, that we hear this all the time and coach speak, which is you can change your narrative, you rewrite your own story, a lot of coaches will say that, because that's what really is happening. It's the narrative that we've operated with, to use your term, it's the operating system. And we get to make the choice, whether we want to continue using that operating system, or whether we're ready for the upgrade, and we're ready to do the work to upgrade the narrative or the operating system that we've been using.

Erica D'Eramo: 22:03

Right? Because rewiring our beliefs is not an easy task. It's yeah. building awareness, right. And building awareness around stuff is not even an easy task. That's like, building in this neural muscle memory that takes time takes practice. Yes, yeah. So tell us a little bit more about how some of these, you know, either false beliefs or false narratives or limiting beliefs, maybe keep us, keep us stagnated, or keep us stuck where we're at?

Kamini Wood: 22:37

Well, again, if that's the operating system that we're using, right, everything is being filtered through that belief. So let's take Advancement at work. For instance, if we have a false belief of I'm not, I'm not good enough, running underneath, it's kind of running behind the scenes, then every time that we are potentially given an opportunity to put ourselves in for a promotion, that that's going to maybe hold us back from taking that step forward. Because the belief behind the scenes is I'm not good enough. So unless we're willing to do that work, that is an example of how we can stay stagnant, we're not going to grow and push ourselves or give ourselves permission to to rise up to the next level. Oftentimes, we talk about my book, our potential, and it's I want to live in to my highest potential. Well, in order to do that, we need to look at what could be potentially holding us back and that, that, generally speaking, are those false beliefs, because they are running the show behind the scenes. You know, my my biggest, you know, between not wanting to be a burden, and people pleasing, what was actually happening was I was worrying about everybody else in my world. And I wasn't paying attention to what my own needs were, or even what I actually desired. Once I gave myself permission to look at that, I realized that wow, I while I love, for instance, running my husband's law, practice in terms of being able to say, this is great, you're getting to, you know, you're living your dream, this is what you've always wanted. And it's great working with the individuals that are here, what I actually want to do is I want to be able to help people one to one, like I actually want to be able to step into the forefront and, and own my own practice and be able to do the thing that I'm actually really passionate about. That was holding me back because I believed that I needed to make sure everybody else was Okay, first was the one that was holding me back. So that's just another example of how our belief systems can hold us back.

Erica D'Eramo: 24:30

Yeah, I mean, using examples is really probably the only way to go about this conversation because it's so varied and unique to each individual, which is why working with a coach can be so helpful, right? Because it takes this exploratory work of questioning and it's not like somebody can tell you just straight up oh, I I'm not gonna put in for that promotion because I don't think I'm capable. And then for you to be able to just say to them, well, that's incorrect. You know, like, you would never say that as poach, never just say, Well, you're wrong, you would explore because there might be a variety of different ways that they think or believe that or it might actually be factually correct based on something. And that doesn't mean that tomorrow you won't be qualified for it. So like, what do we need to do to get there? But yeah, each, each person has such a unique mixture of experiences and core beliefs that there's no one size fits all on this.

Kamini Wood: 25:28

So yeah, exactly, exactly.

Erica D'Eramo: 25:31

So what are some of the ways that you debunk false beliefs? Is there? I mean, is there a way? Is this a trick question? I don't know. Or, like, is this a reasonable question to ask?

Kamini Wood: 25:43

Well, I think it absolutely is a reasonable question to ask, because I think that's the work that that, you know, as coaches, I think, different depending on what type of coaches we are, you know, that's what we're kind of up against is helping our clients see things in a different way, in terms of my work with the false beliefs about self, which is where I kind of focus in terms of recognizing that the relationship with ourselves is the foundational relationship for anything that we want to do in our life. For for me, in terms of my my work, and how I approach it is, you know, first of all getting my client to actually get to the place where they're able to see what that core belief is or what that false belief is. Because once they're able to see it, and they can acknowledge it, now we go into work around, you know, what do you know, is true about yourself outside of that belief? You know, what, what are your values, I think that that's a really important thing for us to take, take into account when we're when we're thinking about our core beliefs, and then take those two things and recognize that those two things are actually what make us who we are, right? So often we think that we are, again, we're identifying with the belief, and instead it's moving identity, into our essence and our being. And it's not the belief, just like we say, we're not the feeling we have or we're not the thought we're having, we're not the belief, right? It's coming back home to Who am I really, and then taking committed action to live into that, that's the only way to really debunk the belief is to recognize what's true about ourselves, come back home to who we are as our inner essence, we're looking at values there, and then take committed action to live into that, because what we're doing there is we're, we're experiencing a totally different narrative. It's one thing to say, I'm going to change the narrative, but again, action, right action experience is going to make our system actually believe it and see it differently.

Erica D'Eramo: 27:36

Yeah, I mean, this sounds like quite the marketing challenge, to be honest, from like a business perspective, to be able to, to work with the the folks who have limiting beliefs, because we're often so unaware of our own limiting beliefs that if you were to say, like, hey, come work with me, if you have limiting beliefs, like people are gonna be like, I don't have any limiting beliefs. Right? So how do you? How would people know that they that they would benefit from maybe coming to find a coach, like yourself to come work through some of this?

Kamini Wood: 28:10

You know, that you're absolutely right, they're not going to necessarily know it's limiting beliefs. It's how we experience it through the symptoms that we have, right? So it's, it's the the individuals who recognize, like, wow, I'm anxious all the time, I do not know how to stop the anxiety, I'm stressed out, I'm, I'm feeling burnt out, I'm noticing a lot of self doubt, right. I'm just, I'm questioning myself all the time. Those be great insights into there's something going on here, I probably need support. And then that's why coaches are important to have because then through that process, the client can start to see it for themselves. Because again, if I come into a situation, or oh, this is a limiting belief, it's not the the person has to see it for themselves, they have to have that, that insight and awakening for themselves. So we start with how are you experiencing life? And where what do you what are you noticing? And where are those those key points? Maybe I hate to put it this way, but those pain points, right, like, where are you? Maybe not, you know, maybe maybe the pain point is not feeling like you're advancing at work, right? That's maybe how you're experiencing it. And then through the conversations that we're having, and through the questions that are being asked, they start to build this insight for themselves of like, oh, wow, that's why and where this is coming from. I'm now understanding, I'm understanding myself better. I'm understanding kind of where this is originating from. And that's when the the are able to make the shifts that they need to because the truth is, we can change certain things at the surface level. You know, a lot of people are like, Oh, well, I'm feeling really anxious, so I'm just gonna meditate more. It will help. It does. It doesn't it definitely brings your stress levels down. But then I'll have clients who say, Yeah, I tried meditation. It worked for a little while and I'm still having the issue like it's still popping back up, right because we haven't done all

Erica D'Eramo: 29:57

the magnesium in the world, isn't it?

Kamini Wood: 30:02

Exactly, exactly. Yeah.

Erica D'Eramo: 30:04

I take a bath of magnesium every night, but it's not gonna fix the underlying challenge here. Yeah.

Kamini Wood: 30:11

Exactly, exactly.

Erica D'Eramo: 30:13

Yeah.

Kamini Wood: 30:13

Yeah.

Erica D'Eramo: 30:14

So. Okay, yeah, I think that that's also helpful for anyone listening who's like, oh, this probably doesn't apply to me. But I do love your emphasis there around, we can just come in. And so maybe this is a bit of, I'll put this out there as a possible red flag to be looking for if you work with someone, and they say, like, well, that's a limiting belief. And they start labeling your beliefs as limiting for you. Because first of all, none of us high achievers want to be told what we are and are not. That's one way to get me to rebel against you immediately is to just start telling me and labeling me and again, pathologizing, right. And we are very perceptive. And so there might be reasons that we are choosing not to see certain things, or acknowledge certain discomforts and might be very uncomfortable to look at. But like shoving somebody's face in it, or telling them that you know, better what is going on with them than they do is completely disempowering and counterproductive. So yes, I think it can take some time. And I love that the approach that you mentioned, where people need to come to this in their own time and see it, and be empowered by it themselves, and opt into any of those changes themselves and not be like, shoved down the road, because you're literally doing the opposite of what we're trying to do, which is self empowerment.

Kamini Wood: 31:40

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. The best metaphor I have is that teenagers, right, if you tell them to clean their room, they're gonna be no not going to but the moment that it's their idea, and they're like, No, I really think that I need to have less clutter in my room. The room is spotless, right? So it's mean, honestly, we just have to treat ourselves that same way where it's recognizing that we, we can't come into it and say, This is what's wrong with you. And that's why I really, I do veer away from pathology, and I just, I constantly say, less pathologizing more understanding.

Erica D'Eramo: 32:12

Yes, yep. Curiosity, what will be effective here? That's, that's one of my biggest questions. What do you think would be most effective here? So I really appreciate some of your insights here today. How would you summarize any key takeaways that you want listeners to retain after the after they kind of close their play their podcast player and have their little mind wipe? What's What are some of the key takeaways that they should retain after this episode?

Kamini Wood: 32:40

Oh, gosh, that's a loaded question. I hope that people walk away one, one very important thing, which is that there's nothing wrong with you. Right? It's that instead, it is truly about giving yourself permission to understand yourself on a deeper level. That would be I think, number one, and number two, is, you know, give yourself permission to get curious with maybe what what are those things that have been holding me back? Right? Why? Why am I feeling certain ways? Or why am I having the same? Oftentimes, it's like the same experiences, why do I keep feeling like I'm experiencing the same thing? Get curious with it. And that's why you know, we've talked about self compassion, get curious and be compassionate, and just see if there's, there's something to learn through that. And then, from there, be able to figure out what your next step is.

Erica D'Eramo: 33:26

Yeah. Like if we were a cat, right? You would? What's going on here? Why are we using a cat who can talk to you? So if anyone wanted to learn more about your offerings connect with you? What's the best way for them to do that?

Kamini Wood: 33:44

I'm on the web at kaminiwood.com And then social media, Facebook, Instagram. That handles @itsauthenticme and I'm also on LinkedIn, under my name.

Erica D'Eramo: 33:54

Excellent. Well, we will be including that in the show notes. And in the little summary blog posts that we include for each episode. And if anyone is looking for the transcript for this episode, you can find that on our website as well, which is two peers consulting.com. We really appreciate you coming on today and sharing your insights. Thank you so much Kamini.

Kamini Wood: 34:13

Thank you for having me. So appreciate it.